Can't get into Reverse

[slednecks1124]

Me and my buddy just recently put a new centerforce clutch in his jeep along with a new flywheel, throw out bearing & pilot bearing. Everything went together good and he drove it from Auburn to Everett once we were finished. He drove it for a few days and then all of a sudden it would not go into reverse, It will go into every other gear just fine. Before we did the clutch the transmission shifted fine into all gears nice and smooth.

I find it hard to believe something just went out or broke in the transmission without any signs or anything, anyone have any ideas of something we may possibly be over looking?

It's a 98 TJ w/ 2.5 four Cylinder, 5.5" Clayton Long Arm Kit and 35's, 4.88 gears, NP231 w/ slip yoke eliminator if that makes any of a difference.

Edit: For some reason i typed 5th gear but I meant it wont go into reverse

 

[TreeClimber]

Hard to guess, too little facts....
but I'm going to guess you pulled the trans to do the clutch, which means I'm also going to guess you pulled the shifter from the top of the trans, so that the trans could come out. So I'm going to further guess that somehow, the shifter is not properly aligned with the shift forks. Does it go into R?

 

[slednecks1124]

Hard to guess, too little facts....
but I'm going to guess you pulled the trans to do the clutch, which means I'm also going to guess you pulled the shifter from the top of the trans, so that the trans could come out. So I'm going to further guess that somehow, the shifter is not properly aligned with the shift forks. Does it go into R?

We pulled the transmission and transfercase as one piece when we did the clutch, we didn't pull the shifter from the top of the trans as we were able to get it out without having to.

ohhh and sorry in my original post I put that it wouldn't go into 5th, I meant reverse sorry.

 

[crash2]

SOunds like just dumb luck...

 

[TreeClimber]

When you say it won't go into R, what exactly do you mean? Does the shifter go to the R position, but the trans 'grinds' instead of accepting the shift.... or, does the shifter seem to hang up, and not quite make it to the R position.... or, the clutch doesn't seem to have enough engagement to allow it to go from a forward gear into a reverse gear... or, ???

Here's what I'd do.
Start the jeep, run it, and then put it into N and shut the engine off.
Then, while it's shut off, see if I could cycle thru the gears, including R.
If it feels like it's in R, then start the jeep while in R, and see if the clutch engages and goes backwards.

If that fails, start by removing the shifter and look at the shift forks, to see if something got *accidentally* shifted while the trans was being moved and is now blocking the shift forks.

Then post back here

And for what it's worth, the early TJs with 4 cyl had a pretty weak transmission. So it could have just been due to fail. It is 13 years old.

 

[slednecks1124]

When you say it won't go into R, what exactly do you mean? Does the shifter go to the R position, but the trans 'grinds' instead of accepting the shift.... or, does the shifter seem to hang up, and not quite make it to the R position.... or, the clutch doesn't seem to have enough engagement to allow it to go from a forward gear into a reverse gear... or, ???

Here's what I'd do.
Start the jeep, run it, and then put it into N and shut the engine off.
Then, while it's shut off, see if I could cycle thru the gears, including R.
If it feels like it's in R, then start the jeep while in R, and see if the clutch engages and goes backwards.

If that fails, start by removing the shifter and look at the shift forks, to see if something got *accidentally* shifted while the trans was being moved and is now blocking the shift forks.

Then post back here

And for what it's worth, the early TJs with 4 cyl had a pretty weak transmission. So it could have just been due to fail. It is 13 years old.

I have not personally seen the Jeep since we did the clutch, my buddy is telling me this over the phone & I have been trying to help him out.

He says it seems like something is blocking the path to reverse, it does not grind it just wont slide into the reverse slot. I had him try to shut the engine off the other day and try to put it into reverse, It still would not allow it to go in.

He took it to Aamco in Everett and the tech there told him to try bleeding the clutch slave cylinder, I would think that it would grind gears if the slave cylinder needed bleeding and would have trouble getting into the other gears also.

 

[boardbysled]

AX-5? Probably dead tranny...

 

[slednecks1124]

AX-5? Probably dead tranny...

I think it's an AX15, I may be wrong

 

[JOOP]

Try shifting in 1st then reverse. I don't know why and how that works but a tranny guy told me that years ago. Something about lining everything up.

Otherwise I would say you don't have it bled correctly or the tranny ****.

Probably an ax-5 tranny. The six cylinders had the ax-15's